The Candle Collection
by Sikla Alkis
Summary: A selection of stories about the fight, of turning darkness into light, and of those who take back the night. Whether winding poem or whirling prose, the Vigil speaks — doors open, then close. What of the people and monsters in its sights? - H:tV
1. 1: Martyrdom

I wished with all my heart that the bad dreams would go away.

From within, I pulled and pulled and _pulled_, begging for a sign, for the strength of will, to help my escape.

Everywhere, there was shrieking, and tenuous cracks of bone; I could feel my heart aching, my very soul tearing in two. So long had I been with the cell – _my _cell – every one of their emotions, from their deepest fears to their darkest desires, was mine. I could feel Prachett's arm give between the monster's jaws, feel Jerry's throat ache with exhaustion as he screamed from the toxins consuming him. Magdalene wasn't even moving anymore, her eyes staring blankly, every limb and muscle seized up like a dead man's. Somewhere above me, Laurence gurgled, and a surge of hot bile wound up my throat as he vomited dinner and blood.

My legs turned to jelly, my head pounding, my heart stinging. No matter what I did, I could not summon up the strength to keep going. All my conviction, my willpower, gone – I couldn't say if it was my cell being ripped to pieces in front of me, or if I was just too exhausted from the fight. I had gone in swinging, far ahead of the rest of them; the rest of the beasts had been waiting for them to follow me in. I had been too brash, too wild, and too bloodthirsty for common sense to hold me back.

And now, my teammates were dying, crumpled and broken heaps all around me. I was on my knees, voiceless, wracked with pain of my own and that of the others. The monsters advanced, claws and teeth dripping red; they were skulking, humanoid fingers with a mouth of fine, sharp teeth. Their black-nailed fingers were perfect for gouging, the claws broad and sharp, reminding me of small but wide knives. Their eyes were black and beady – not unlike a hungry rat's – and they smelt of the sewage and old, broken pipe systems they had emerged from.

Like animals and demons, they growled in anticipation for me. I thought I heard a groan from Jerry or Prachett, but at that point, I was too far gone to care. I let them sink those claws in deep, using more force than a biting shark as their talons went down to the muscle. I cried out, yes, when I had never cried out before – I was that weak. More claws sunk into me, and then those horrible, needle-like teeth, yellowed with plague and full of neurotoxin to keep me in place. Apparently I tasted better than any of the bodies nearby, for the creatures barely touched them. I let my blood flow freely, going limp as they pinned me, the meat torn from my bones with a single rip.

In the haze of shock and hurt, I heard a voice. _Their _voices, in fact, and not the smacking and slurping of feeding creatures. They were finally coming to me when I thought I was surely dead; my eyes rolled to glance across the gore-splattered dirt. I caught sight of that one, whitish wisp, a blinding light at the edge of my eyes, and I swallowed back blood. I closed my eyes; loud and clear did their message ring in my quickly-fogging mind.

_**LET NOT THE DARKNESS TAKE YOU.**_

_**INHERIT OUR LEGACY.**_

_**INHERIT THE EARTH.**_

_**LET OUR LIGHT SHINE FOR YOU.**_

_Yes. I understand._

It was now or never. They let me dig deeper than I had ever before, reaching beyond my soul and into a brilliant, shining mass that lay deep in my mind. I stretched out, I seized that mass, and I let it melt into my fingertips and into a warm, pulsing sensation. I let it become one with my lifeblood, my veins and my circulation, and what was mortal plasma and cells was now a divine ichor. I felt no pain, only the rush, the heat of the light; my eyes did open, and the ghouls screamed in horror and disgust. I let that energy surge past them, into them, reminding of their own lacking humanity, their vices and sins. My flesh in their jaws burned them, and my ragged body stood, despite being torn to near ribbons. I nearly fell, and my mouth ran red, but I stood. I let them suffer under the light only I could see, and I silently apologized to whoever of my cell was still alive. The headaches and terror-ridden fugue would pass, but it was an unfortunate side-effect of the power of the voices.

The creatures before me rotted and withered. They tried to pull back on sloughed flesh and grime, their bodies steaming, the entire clearing reeking. I felt a slight shake through my body as adrenaline threatened to give, but when it did, I simply pulled more of the light from within me. It made me feel like a thousand punches were laid upon my gashes and bite marks, but that was the price I would pay. Someone, after all, had to suffer in the place of the innocent.

I looked around, and saw Laurence's pistol on the floor. As the creatures were keeping well away from me, it didn't take long for me to seize and start firing. My shots were sloppy, as exhaustion was creeping in; my light wouldn't hold up for much longer. I would collapse and bleed to death, most likely, but I wouldn't go down without a fight. One creature went down, twitching wildly before it ceased to move; another moaned and cried in pain, something between a human cry and an indescribable snarl, and I dispatched it with the last of the pistol's round. I took a nearby rock – primitive, but it would do – and ran towards another mother, bringing forth more of my light to wash over it. It screamed a blood-curdling scream as it burned up beneath my might, silenced only when I thrust the rock deep into its eye. The _squish _that accompanied the attack was more satisfying than anything I had ever experienced; vengeance and I were old friends, but now, as I was dying and fighting at the same time, it was…. Fulfilling. It was like I had finally found what I wanted in life, and that was to see the stiff gawk that the monster's expression was frozen into.

I thought I heard movement behind me, and I turned to see the beasts were scurrying for the dark of the forest. Prachett was moving with a loud groan, shakily trying to stand despite his arm hanging by mere threads. Magdalene let out a choking noise, letting everyone else know she was alive, and I smiled in relief. They would be okay. They would get over this, they always did.

With some reluctance, I let the light go, fizzling out after the great and grand display it had shown. Jerry vomited, trying to fight back crying, before stiffening up as Magdalene had. I closed my eyes, breathing deeply, the smell and taste of bodily fluids and seared, rotting flesh surging into my mouth and lungs.

I gave in, finally, and let the walls of my will crash around me. What I can only describe as being hit by a train consumed me from head to toe.

* * *

><p><strong><em>- <span>Martyrdom<span> -_**

_The World of Darkness__ copyright White Wolf Publishing_

_OC characters copyright me_


	2. 2: Breaking Point

_Breathe._

"Just try to breathe, relax, don't rush it." That was what they always said - they _always _said - when the headaches became too much to handle. He hadn't gotten enough sleep (again) and the last scene – an accident – had been…hard to work in. There were three children involved, and the crash was horrific; they had all sat in the back, all with a beautiful red-and-yellow quilt thrown over them, sleeping soundly as their mother drove them home from a relative's house –

No, he had to stop. Stop, breathe, relax and chill – a mantra as old as "rinse and repeat". The painkillers were laid out before him, a smattering of white pills from two or three different bottles. What to take, what to take…so many decisions, so little time before the sun came up. _CNN _blared in the background, a dim but painful hum in his bedraggled, aching mind. Throwing thoughts to the wind, he grabbed a handful of his usual, then chugged them back with some ice-cold water. The drink made his teeth ache, his jaw and temples pulsing; maybe now, he could get to bed.

He'd need a moment to take a breath. Slowly, he leaned back on his couch, his eyelids fluttering. _God_, he was so tired nowadays, and the slow but steady resistance he was building to his meds wasn't helping. Neither were the recurring nightmares of Hill Manor: the screaming residents, foaming at the mouth and clawing at him; some old "warlock" screaming for revenge and his blood; the hallways that changed and warped at will, and the outside…. The _outside_, with half of the building just _hovering_ there, and the reeking stench of sulphur and bodies and something he couldn't name –

More bad thoughts. More hallucinations. He could see the walls of his house shifting, again with the blood-splattered walls and peeling paint of the Manor, which looked like _skin _sloughing off the walls like off burns. The news became but a slowing, thrumming voice, twisting and deep and distant, as more and more of the room changed. He was imagining himself running, the screaming, wispy beings and their open, hanging faces calling for him; they wanted him dead. They wanted him to join them, to add his voice the raging and howling chaos of the Hell they had wrought. He was so _hungry_, then he was so _tired_, and then he was angry, so very _angry_.

It felt like his skull was about to be cleaved in two. He cried out, holding his head in his hands, and nausea overwhelmed him. In-between feeling flesh-wallpaper and mundane carpet, smelling dead body and old scents from a late dinner, he ran for the bathroom. He nearly faceplanted into the toilet water, throwing up his pills and his food and a soda from two hours earlier; tears fell. They always fell when somebody vomited, he found, but maybe that was just him. For ten minutes, he could barely move, barely breathe, and his entire body was shaking like an aspen in a fall wind.

He finally let go, slumping against the bathtub beside him, and he groaned. Then, he cried, hoarse and breathless, and his entire self was cold and drifting. He needed sleep, _oh Jesus _did he need sleep, but he had to be back on shift in two hours. Two hours. Dawn was only three away, and he had only got off his last shift an hour and a half ago. He couldn't keep doing this to himself, and the painkillers would only work for so long.

He let himself lie there for a while; it would be the closest thing to sleep he would achieve that night. Then, he took a breath, pulled himself together, and pushed himself up off the floor. One hand batted at the toilet lever until it flushed its contents. The other gripped the sink as he leaned against it, staring back at a baggy-eyed, pallid reflection with more tousled hair than usual. His black mop and five-o'-clock shadow stood starkly against the drained colour in his face, and he definitely considered shaving before going in. Then, he realized, that shaving would only expose more of his pale face, and he'd look dead, and he'd deal with a battery of questions of how he was feeling. Again.

_Screw it; it's not worth the trouble._

He turned the water on as cold as he could, and splashed his face with both hands. Slowly rubbing at his nose and eyes, he could feel the sharp pains of sensory clashes, of the stabbing headache recoiling at such cold water. Yet, he waited, and then it subsided into a dull, tolerable ache. Taking some more painkillers would probably eliminate it entirely, and keep at bay the migraine that would inevitably come back.

One last time, he looked in the mirror to survey himself.

"**JESUS!"**

But that was not his reflection. A spider instead stared back, black and hoary, a single milky eye in the centre of its abdomen. In the back of his mind, he heard the faintest whisper of a voice – _"Why are you so surprised, lovely?"_ And with those pincers it had, _despite_ those pincers of it had, it seemed to _grin _at him.

He felt urine, and then smelt it, riding down his legs and soaking the seat of his pants. He screamed and punched the glass with all his might, scattering it into many different shards, big and small, some with his blood. His wrist, dripping and burning, was ignored as he ran out of the room. He did not stop, bolting down the hallway and across his meagre living room, before throwing open the door. So strong and great was his terror, he did not think to put on his shoes – he just needed to _get out_.

It was only in the hallway of his new building's entrance did he snap out of his fit. He collapsed against a nearby wall, breaking down into loud, wailing cries, not caring if anyone woke or how undignified it made him look. He cried as no man should ever cry, in his mind, and he curled up and buried his face into his warm, wet legs. Sleep be damned, work be damned, he would not move _from that spot_; nobody came to see him, thankfully, and he bawled 'til his chest and throat were sore.

Then, as his addled mind cleared, he slowly reached for his pocket. There, always in case of emergency, was his cell phone. His partner Doug was on speed dial, again in case of emergency. Again, again, again – it was a word he was too familiar with, and everything had to stop. Doug would help, he knew about Hill Manor; hell, he'd nearly caused the strung-out pill-junkie to break down with what came next.

"_There are people like you and me," _he had said, _"who know about these kinds of things. They happen all the time, Mike; you're just lucky __**our **__people know how to keep them quiet. You following me?"_

He had said it too calmly that Mike could call him irrational. His fingers kept sliding before he finally hit the right button, and his teeth would not stop chattering. The other end rung for an agonizingly long minute before there was a click and Doug's familiar, "Hello?"

"D-Doug, man," said Mike, "y-you've gotta c-come to m-my ap-p-p-partment…r-r-right, right _now_."

"Mike, what happened?" said Doug, instantly slipping into that tone of voice he used with patients on the edge of shock. "Are you okay?"

"N-no…" said Mike, his words trailing off into another sob. A single tear slid down each cheek. "Oh G-God, man…th-there was…there was s-something in my _mirror_, Doug…God _damn it_, it looked…it had an eye…it _talked_, Doug, and I…I…I…."

"Mike!" barked Doug. "Mike, snap out of it! Where are you now?"

Mike took in a sharp breath to steady himself. "Th-the lobby…" he said. "I can't…I c-can't go back up there alone, Doug…I need help…."

"I'm on my way, Michael," said Doug. "Don't move, don't do anything stupid. Are you hurt?"

"J-just my f-fist…" said Michael. "I c-cut it real b-bad…."

"How bad is the bleeding? Can you staunch it until we get there?"

"Y-yeah," said Mike, glancing down at his wounded hand. Now that the adrenaline was out of his system, it was starting to smart badly. "I th-think I can…wait, 'we'?"

"I'll explain later, Mikey," said Doug. "Just hang in there; I'll be fifteen minutes, tops, I promise."

"A-all right…" said Mike, feeling his heart rate slow just a little. "Th-thanks, Doug…."

"No problem, Nero," said Doug, the call ending with another click. Slowly, Mike closed his cell, his hand gripping the plastic hard enough to make it creak. He let out a shaky sigh of relief, slowly sliding down the wall by an inch.

It was time for the pain to stop. No more pills, no more nightmares, no more flashbacks and wondering why. He had to get help or he'd kill himself, he swore he would. All his life, he had fought to cope with loss, with upheaval, with finding a reason for everything – enough was enough. He couldn't go crazy like he had in his apartment, either; the landlady was already enough of an old crone to deal with. Explaining that he had smashed her property because of a giant, one-eyed spider was like convincing him that the president was an alien from the moon.

Then again, he decided that, if giant mirror-spiders were possible in his world, then so was an alien president. He decided to end that train of thought, before he started thinking like a conspiracy theorist on _Coast to Coast_.

* * *

><p><em><strong>- <span>Breaking Point<span> -**_

_The World of Darkness__ copyright White Wolf Publishing_

_OC characters copyright me_


	3. 3: Hotter than Hell or Sun

The entire room smelt of scorched flesh and charred surroundings. Ash and soot, mingling with odour of melting fat, stuck to everyone's skin and the inside of their nose and throat. A river of black and yellow – hundreds of buzzing wasps, glaring with unblinking faces – zoomed towards the rolling figure of fire. The blue and white light, with the flames even hotter than a welding iron's, was blistering the agents' skin even from several feet away. Around the engulfed creature, three of the cell lay dead, one but blackened charcoal and without a single feature recognizable.

Andrea Taggart swore as the wasps blackened and fell – _SHIT! _she thought as she nearly avoided stepping into a burning patch of floor. They couldn't even get close without withering into a heap, despite being drawn to the monster like it was honey. Attack swarms were hardy equipment, built to last and intimidating as all hell; when they got back to the queen bee, Gabreski was going to have his ass chewed out. And probably kicked to the couch, too – that alpha bitch of a girlfriend was _relentless _when it came to failure. She always found something new to criticise them about: they had drawn too much attention, they had missed a certain deadline, they hadn't gotten enough of this sample or that sample –

"ANDREA! **Down!**"

Andrea ducked, just in time to miss a plume of flame that had been fired back at them. The creature held its hand out like Vince Gabreski had, palm turned upwards, the sky-blue blaze erupting from its wrist. A way of taunting them, maybe? If it was – and Andrea could swear its brightly-glowing face was smirking at them – she was going to rip one of its six wings off. Edged with long plumes that made them look like an eagle's, they were constantly flapping guts of hot air, always knocking the Keystone cell back. Everyone was sweating like a pig, and Andrea's throat and mouth were dry and sore. It was like she was standing in the middle of a house fire, which wasn't too far from the truth; the broken-down, abandoned office would soon burn down to the ground. The cell would have pulled out by then if Gabreski hadn't insisted on pursuit; that had cost them the two other men.

"Andrea! I'm running low!" Gabreski shouted. "Fall back behind that wall! Grab the guns and aim for the head!"

"There are no guns, Gabreski!" Andrea screeched. "That thing melted them like wax! We have to get out, _now_!"

"Not without a sample!" Gabreski yelled back. "Cover me!"

Andrea wanted nothing more than smash Gabreski's head in. What did he think she could do – leap onto the living _furnace_ and rip off something of value? The last time she checked, her surgically-grafted claws, extended from beneath her natural fingernails, weren't fireproof. She was as loyal as a dog to Gabreski, but that didn't mean she couldn't disagree with him.

Or, as of lately, find him rather stupid and desperate to appease his woman. There was a reason fraternization rules existed, and before Alicia Mangum, Gabreski had been far, far more competent. As he ran forward, shooting out another stream of wasps as he fired madly at their target's face, Andrea ran up behind him. The creature raised its wings.

_FWOOM!_

Both agents jerked to the side like magnets of the same polarity. The gust passed between them with little to no damage; the teammates felt part of their clothes singe, but that was it. Yet, as they closed the distance again between hunter and prey, their skin ached and began to redden considerably. Little white flakes began to appear, followed by chafing and painful, rising blisters that added more pockmarks to their skin. Yet, as they squinted and surged forward, the wetness in their eyes disappearing, they did not waver. For the two former cops, it was now or never: their one last chance to get a sample, and one last chance for Gabreski to prove himself to Alicia.

The creature snarled something in an inhuman tongue, raising what Andrea assumed to be its hand. Gabreski roared and, with the special environmentally-treated knife he had requisitioned from Keystone Pharma, swiped. It made contact with what were the flaming figure's fingers – only to pass through as if Vince had cut dead air. His pale blue eyes widened as that same hand wrapped itself around Gabreski's throat, lifting him to its eye-level. It had to be at least seven feet tall.

"**Qashmal'a istier eru."**

Andrea's blood, despite the heat, turned cold. Vince's neck was quickly turning red and then blackening to a crisp.

"**Eru, sfissiya, istem anim alim."**

She could not move, nor could she speak. Had her face not been so puce with the heat, it would have been sheet-white. Gabreski let out a strangle-choked as the figure wrapped its wings around him, holding him close, as if to embrace. It gave what sounded like a sigh, and shone ever so brightly; there was nothing but intense, blaring white in Andrea's eyes. She screamed in agony, clutching at her face, as the white turned to black; something hot and sticky began flowing down her face and cheeks from her eye sockets. She clawed at them, desperately trying to open her eyes back up, but found no eyelids to move.

_"**Hanzerih halima aqquum!"**_

Vince screamed like Andrea had never heard him scream before – a long, drawn-out echo that faded into nothing, as if he were falling off a cliff into some bottomless pit below. An eerie sensation washed over her, something that had the feeling of electricity mixed in with the oily slickness of molten fat; Andrea realized a second later that it was liquefied flesh. The boiling gore coated her from head to toe, and she, too, screamed as loud as she could.

Everything roared with an intense explosion, ripping through the building and gutting it in seconds. Debris flew everywhere, too black and burnt, just as the agent had been, to identify. A great, blue-white glow rose into the sky, followed by a small blast wave and a plume of orange-red and yellow.

* * *

><p><em><strong>- <strong>__**Hotter than Hell or Sun**__** -**_

_The World of Darkness__ copyright White Wolf Publishing_

_OC characters copyright me_


	4. 4: Black

Skitter-stalk, pitter-patter, all across the walls. Shadow play and dancing – tendrils, tendrils, tendrils, all my own. Body in the dark, now _of_ the dark, always watching. Shadows come and take me up, skitter-skitter-stalking. Eyes peer out; I see everything down, hanging upside-up.

"Elena!" says a voice. "Elena, come out! We know you're in here!"

_Lucy? _I wonder, cocking my slick shadow-head. So long it has been since I heard Officer Villanueva's voice – we were friends before the shadows took me, before they wrapped me tight, held me close. I…I think I have seen her before, but not seen her. My shadows saw her, is what I mean; when your mind is of the shadow, you see things that are not you, and things you're not seeing yourself.

Flashlight beams across the floor. Shadows crawl back, and the light _hurts_. Must pull back, must not be seen; light is a knife, light burns up the shadows, light chases away the dark. Without my blackness, I am weak – what does Lucy want from me?

Footsteps, one set and two. Lucy is not alone, and someone walks, talks with her. "You sure about this?" says a boyish voice, and from my eyes on the room's other side, I see him. He is young, thuggish-looking, holds a knife – sharp for the killing. Skitter-skulk, skitter-patter I do, across the walls and behind to watch. I do not trust him around Lucy. "I mean, she's been missing for four years; maybe you made a mistake?"

Lucy huffs. The indignant one, she is. "I checked the photos," says Lucy, "and that's definitely her in them. I don't know how the hell she became…_that_, or who the hell did it to her, but we need to help her. Carcione's boys will kill her if we don't do something; she's said to be hostile, they're not going to let what she did slide."

The thug huffs. "Can you blame them, Boss-Bitch?" says the thug; my oily skin curdles at the name. How dare he show such disrespect to her! "She ripped a chunk of a man's arm out _with a shadow_. That's not normal, that's fucked up _Twilight Zone_ shit right there."

"Which is why we need to find her," Lucy insists. My many-eyes can see more people coming in: a woman in a pencil suit, more suited for a boardroom; a baseball-bat wielding man, who I can see surgical scars on if I peer closely; a tweed-wearing gentleman with slicked-back hair. Friends of Lucy's? How odd that they would come looking too.

_They__'__re hunting you,_ my little shadows say. _They__'__re scared of you. They want to trap you in a dark you can__'__t see through. _I tell my shadows to hush, that I will draw my own judgments of the group; only then shall I let my kin feed. Lucy was a friend – I remember the days I spent with her and her girl-child, the times she held me when the shakes overtook me, and when she took me from the party filled with drugs and booze and men. They are…fond memories, but they slip from me, out of my reach – skitter-skulk, twitch-twitch, move and move and avoid the light –

"What was that?"

The tweed-wearing man speaks – he really ought to get some decent clothes. I now dangle above him, still one with my precious dark. I coax myself down on a spider-like strand: inky webbing of my own unique design. Such is the power of my shadows and the fallen dark, the void I am one with, the abyss that is neither so distant nor deep. I stretch out my arms and let them become tendrils, each finger wispy ephemera, stretching in fluid slowness across the space yet between. I am drawn to him….

"VICTOR!"

Out of a reflex, a gun pulled and a bullet fired. Lucy swears and screams my name; I yowl the most blood-curdling of yowls, and I can feel their blood run cold. The light of the pistol stings, but the bullet cleaves hot and true through my not-flesh. I swing my newly-sharpened claws and I rake, rake and rake.

They shouldn't have come into the shadows. They should have left me well enough alone. _Slice and cut, slice and cut, well and deep before going back into the dark __–_

* * *

><p><em><strong>- <span>Black<span> -**_

_The World of Darkness__ copyright White Wolf Publishing_

_OC characters copyright me_


	5. 5: An Cailín Nach A Raibh Aon Ainm

Once upon a time, there was a girl who created pictures.

Day after day, night after night, she would toil away in the corridors between buildings. Sketching-pad in hand, she would search every nook and cranny for every pen, pencil and paint she could find, and sometimes, if she could find none, she would smear the pictures into existence with dirt. Huddled up in rags and in the cold, she drew many marvelous things: scenes out of tapestries, Biblical epics, mystically-tattooed beasts and landscapes straight out of the imagination. Even the quickest of sketches was a work of art, in her eyes, and everything she made breathed with life and joy and sound.

And that fact was most literal.

When she drew, she created, just as the gods might have. Sometimes, she chose to keep her works bound to paper; she was content with making the paper itself pretty. But sometimes, on the darkest of nights, in the loneliest of rains, she craved the presence of a friend. And so, she'd take her finger, and put the skin between her teeth; she would bite down, and blood would be drawn. With this blood, in an arcing smear across her work, divine ichor would leak into graphite and ink and blankness. Then, with some effort, she'd reach into the very page itself — and behold, glory of glories! There stood a deer, white as the virgin snow, its mighty antlers dangling with the softest of moss. Or perhaps, if she had recently read the holy books, a winged lion of glass would roar to the unending sky.

She knew not her name, nor her birthplace, save that it was Ireland. All that she knew herself was as "_An Cailín Nach A Raibh Aon Ainm_" — "The Girl That Had No Name". She had seen the name in her sketchbook once, in the earliest memories she could recall, above a crude self-portrait she had drawn. Whether or not it was a poetic statement from some far-off life, she knew not; all she knew was that she had nothing else to glean from. She eventually moved from the corridors between buildings, seeking more about her origins, and lived behind a closed-down orphanage for a long, long time.

All that changed when a strange, heavily-dressed man came to her one cold, Irish morning. The sun rose bleakly over Belfast, the Sunday bells ring-a-dinging to call all to Mass. The Girl That Had No Name had risen from sleep for the morning prayers, planning to proceed to church for worship and breakfast that day. There was a small soup kitchen on the way there, and she would grab a quick bite before church; the heavily-dressed man stopped her.

_"Can I help you, sir?"_ she asked, not in English but the native, Gaelic tongue. Despite living in Northern Ireland, it was all she could remember knowing, and English easily eluded her. The heavily-dressed man looked at her sadly, gently placing worn, delicate hands upon the maiden's shoulders.

_"You can help yourself, my child," _he said, responding in Gaelic with a fluent man's accent. _"Tarry in going to your prayers today; run and hide until I come and get you. Something bad shall happen soon."_

The Girl scoffed, disgusted by such a notion. Why on Earth should she tarry to the call of church bells? She folded her arms, scowling darkly at him. _"What are you talking about, old man?" _she said, unable to help her harsh tongue. _"Do you want me to insult the Lord?"_

_"Not at all, An Cailín Nach A Raibh Aon Ainm," _he said, _"but the Lord wishes you to live. Come with me, hurry! We don't have much time!"_

The Girl was about to protest, but then was swept off her feet and carried away. The stranger moved with great speed, his long, grey hair falling and tickling her face and cheeks. She yelled at him to put her down, flung out her hands and kicked at him — and he did, eventually, dropping The Girl behind a pile of garbage and tin sheeting.

_"Say not a word, An Cailín Nach A Raibh Aon Ainm," _said the man. The Girl went to protest, only to have a hand clamped over her mouth. Between the strands of the man's hair, she thought she could see an empty eye socket; it made her more afraid. _"There are some very bad men about. Keep still, my child; the gods bless you wherever you go."_

He released her, and as quickly as he moved, he strode away in a swirl of fabric and his mane. Snow flew from his steps as a cold wind blew, and The Girl quickly stood up, watching as he disappeared around the corner. She went to run, heading in the opposite direction he had; she did not want to stay should he be a criminal. Before had people nearly learned of her talents, and their eyes had glistened with greed or suspicion, their hungry fingers outstretched, claws to grab her with. Had this man somehow found out of her talents? Had he hunted her down, stalked her, made her his mark for whatever uncouth or scoundrel's planning he had in mind? Yes, it was wise to run.

Or rather, she would have run, had it not been the wild explosions that followed afterwards, sending smoke and debris flying into her face as people screamed and alarms sounded.

* * *

><p><strong>- <em><span>An Cailín Nach A Raibh Aon Ainm<span> -_**

_The World of Darkness__ copyright White Wolf Publishing_

_OC characters copyright me_


	6. 6: Cat and Mouse

The smell of gasoline was rich in the air by the moon-speckled, forested road. It mingled with and sweetened the rows of pine and cedar, warm and dewy in the summer night. Flecked across the sky like a glittering dust, the stars shone clearly, only a few wisps of tangled, ragged cloud to soil them. The dark was rich with song, crickets and coyotes making their music in turn; a gentle wind carried their voices across the wood.

Her mouth was heavy and moist with saliva. The gentle swaying of the branch she perched upon did nothing to interrupt her concentration. Her eyes, wide and round as the wolf moon, watched the road with great, black pupils. They had stretched to their limits to accommodate as much light as they could; she was under heavy cover as to not be seen. Her claws dug into the bark, grip tight with anticipation, and she breathed in as another car passed by. Every sound, from squeak of tire to groan of an overused engine, filtered into her sensitive ears.

_Dodge Ram. '97-'98 model. Poor condition, shocks about to give, needs an oil change._

She gave a quiet sigh. No, that was not her target that night; the beat-up, blue Eagle she awaited had not passed by. Perhaps her prey had caught wind of her premeditated hunt; he was said to have eyes and ears everywhere, if the poor souls she had caught were true. Always watching with cameras everywhere — dozens, if not hundreds, lined _his_ section of interstate — and his minions kept an ear out in his territory. She had been careful not to kill any of them directly; she'd let one go, for example, only to pursue him with in a furious cacophony. He had been so frightened by her; the State Trooper had run out in front of a semi just to escape. Her victim was so badly mangled, no one could have seen that final look of terror frozen onto his face.

She rubbed her muscled jaw with one hand, musing over her situation. On the one hand, her prey would probably pick up the pattern of deaths almost immediately. He'd be spooked, and he would hide in his safehouse, waiting for the danger to pass before her prowled again. On the other hand, it had been weeks ago that she had killed his agents, and only a few then. She still wasn't sure whether or not he'd put any in danger to find her, but she couldn't shake the feeling she had been watched. Her…"condition", as it were, made her fairly obvious to any passerby who glimpsed her. The only place she could hide in plain sight was out of sight.

It was so _frustrating_ to try and think two steps ahead of her prey. Or ten. The man had a talent for ingenious planning, that was for sure; she had once observed, via her hearing, coordinate a seemingly-harmless accident to single out one victim. There was something to be said about a man who turned an ambulance into a torture suite — playing on his target's schizophrenia was just plain cold. If he was going to be a predator, then he shouldn't be so sadistic…. Not that she had any right to speak about such things, of course. Several corpses back at her lair had some degree of slowly-inflicted wound.

_That was only for the ones who deserved it_, she reminded herself. There was no need to start thinking like a _monster_, even if her humanity had slowly slipped away over the years. It was time for the huntress to return to work, to perform one more, bloodless slaying for her survival and others'. It had been a sad day when she had realized how tied her conscience was to justifying death, and so, she had set out to make the best of it.

* * *

><p>The game of cat and mouse had gone on for weeks. Harvey didn't think it would ever end, and — though he'd never admit it — her fingers ached from the exposed quick of each nail. His paranoia and worst fears had been looming over him, frightful as an angry parent or police officer to others. Someone had been following him, caught in mere glimpses of his cameras. Day and night, he had been singling out frames and stills, studying every detail he could of the enigma on screen. Wings, white and black feathers, and a humanoid figure: a lithe woman. Oh, she had been a clever little bitch, stalking and profiling his playthings as he did; she, like him, was some sort of hunter. His stomach spun around itself in a knot — could she have learned of his Map? Was she, like the Watery Doctor and The Man With the Moth, after the same puzzle he sought to find?<p>

The thought of such a thing nearly gave Harvey a heart attack. Over time, he had begun to lose composure; he would miss the little things, at first, such as an odd shadow or a strange shape. Then she began to hide herself entirely, silently mocking him, teasing him with her presence. _Come play, _her pre-recorded self seemed to say — a temptress of the night, seducing his fears and coaxing them out of the back of his mind. A few of his pawns had been lost in earlier weeks, and he had no doubt, from his observations, she had been at the death scenes. Fear was replaced with an inner heat, and Harvey began to seethe with rage at the image of _her _using _him_. Oh, but the joke would be on that little whore, that twisted bitch, who was no doubt some kind of monster. She might have even been like him, only with a body warped by her or others. A pretender was all she was, yes….

His research had been interesting. Though he had found dozens of cases of murder by exsanguination — sometimes with unexplained bite and claw wounds — her description had turned up two times there. Though vague in retelling, most likely from shock, trauma and the focus on fleeing rather than observing, he had found mentions of feathers and yellow eyes. Both had been out in the Pine Barrens, a perfect place to hide; why had the strange woman come to his stretch of road? Had she been seeking new hunting grounds? Harvey's agents couldn't provide an answer, only that they had been followed. Plotting out their sightings in one of his many atlases, he found she had been going up and down his general route. Was she waiting for him, for whatever reason? Had she chosen him as her next victim? A bold move for someone who obviously wished to stay hidden. A smile eased across his face; there must have been some sort of personal cause or vendetta involved. It was perfect for twisting the knife with once the predator turned into his prey.

With the moon at its fullest, Harvey would have plenty of light to see by. His target wouldn't be so stupid as to assault outright, but she might try and throw him off. He picked up his cell — a disposable one, of course — and gloved fingers dialed his first helper.

"This is the Driver," he said, voice monotone. "Prepare for our guest. Light the fires, just as I told you; make a scene."

* * *

><p>When one knew they were expected, it was best to prepare for anything. Her prey would no doubt pull something from his sleeve, whether it was backup or some kind of stunt. She could easily be outnumbered, overwhelmed, outgunned — and she had a feeling she wouldn't die quickly. If her target didn't torture her for information, he might do it for the sake of sadistic pleasure. Or, if she had annoyed him put him in a compromising enough position, he'd kill her on the spot. Her observations had showed that he was flexible, tailoring any situation to fit the variables at hand. Finding cameras planted <em>in <em>the trees along his route had hammered that fact home.

For all the man's ingenuity, though, he could not escape his madness.

* * *

><p><em><strong>- <span>Cat and<span> Mouse -**_

_The World of Darkness__ copyright White Wolf Publishing_

_OC characters copyright me_


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